Perfect
by Serra-Of-Many-Names
Summary: Mytho's love wasn't enough to save Kraehe from herself. Dark AU in which Rue returned to being Kraehe after killing the Raven. Rating for disturbing imagery and sexual references.
1. Raven and Nestling

The Raven Queen woke from a dreamless sleep, covered by nothing but her black sheets and her pet's arms. Surrounding her, as usual, were the dark granite walls of her bedroom, the chandelier twinkling in the early morning light. Sunlight filtered through the red glass of the arched windows, scattered across the stone floor, played across her pet's back and her own shoulders. With a gesture of Kraehe's hand, a raven flew to one of the windows and nudged it open. A breeze flowed through the room, rustling the black hangings on the bed. The fragrance of the roses on the nightstand mixed with the heady scent of sex and blood from the night before.

It was a perfect morning.

Her pet was fast asleep, his head pillowed against her breast, his breath slow and even. He always slept with her like this, with his arms tightly wound around her waist and his body pressed as close to her as possible... like a man slept with his lover. Like a child slept with his mother. Perhaps, Kraehe mused as she watched his sleeping face, the two were not so different for him. He was completely dependent on her, helpless, like a chick in the nest. Without her, he would wither from lack of sustenance as quickly as from lack of love. But then, it wasn't quite his fault. He could hardly find food on his own. And Kraehe didn't mind nursing him.

She nudged the man in her arms gently. "Wake up, my pet. Time for breakfast."

His eyes fluttered open, and he blinked at her a few times. Kraehe recalled amusedly when he had had to scramble for his glasses every morning before he could look at her properly. "Good morning, my queen."

Without replying, she reached for the knife on her bedside table, drawing a line across her palm. Her pet's eyes widened, and he reached for her wrist, but Kraehe batted him away irritatedly. "Not yet, dear. You know I prefer to feed you directly."

Her lips fastened around the cut on her palm, and she drew the red liquid into her mouth, savoring the taste of her blood. It was quite good, if one were in the mood for thick, coppery things--which he always seemed to be--but she swallowed very little, holding the majority of it in her mouth. With her unwounded hand, she cradled the back of his head, pulling his mouth to hers. The blood poured from her mouth to his, and he swallowed greedily, his tongue tangling with hers in her mouth.

She smirked as she pulled back, traces of blood marring both of their faces. "Good morning, Autor."


	2. Fearless Knight

A/N: Thanks for the surprisingly positive response to this story, guys! I was feeling inspired the other day, so I did a chapter for Fakir too. Hope you like this as much as the last one!

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Two hours before midnight, Fakir rose from the bed, his practiced hands pulling his clothes on silently in the dark. He could not afford to make a sound. Mytho awoke too easily these days, and with his heart fully restored he was not so easily subdued as when they were young. The prince did stir a little when Fakir's weight left the mattress, groping for a body that was no longer there; but when Fakir replaced himself in Mytho's arms with a pillow, the younger man seemed satisfied, nuzzling against the pillow and settling back into a peaceful sleep. Crisis averted, Fakir threw his robe over his shoulders and headed out into the living room.

The duck-turned-girl was asleep on the couch, as she almost always was this time of night, with a book lying open on her chest. She would wake in about two hours and stumble off to her own bed, so Fakir had to be careful when he returned, lest he rouse her suspicions. Ahiru had caught him heading outside a few times, before he had discerned her sleeping schedule, and the results had not been pleasant. Both Ahiru and Mytho had threatened him with a variety of painful punishments for putting himself in such danger, and by the third time he allowed himself to be caught Fakir had been forced to promise under pain of death that he would never leave the house after dark again.

Not that that had completely stopped him from doing it, of course. It had only stopped him from doing it for about a week, until both of them had relaxed their surveillance on him. Then, ten days after the three-way screaming match, he had silently risen from his bed again and crept out to do what he had been born to do.

His sword slung across his hip, Fakir entered the empty street. It was a bit early yet, but the ravens would be out soon, searching for Mytho's heart. He no longer feared them; he merely lay in wait for them, hidden in the shadow in the front of the abandoned ice-cream shop. Fakir had grown to suit the role of his former self much better since Kraehe had felled him the first time, all those years ago. He was no longer the same boy who had been distracted from his duty by his childish fear of black birds. Even when one of those birds had been the man he had called his father for close to twenty years, he had not wavered. A knight could not allow himself to waver, a knight could not allow himself to succumb to fear. A knight must face his fear and stand strong against it.

"One year, twenty-one days, eighteen hours and thirty-six minutes."

Fakir nearly snapped his neck as his head whipped toward the noise, though he recognized the voice as soon as he heard it. Kraehe's pet, Autor. The only other Story-Spinner in Kinkan Town; and one of the only remaining humans, for that matter. "What the hell are you talking about?"

"That's how long it's been since we last saw each other." Autor chuckled--a sickening sound, that laughter, like the croaking of a raven--and took a step closer to Fakir, leaning on the wall of the shop. "You remember, don't you? I left you with a nice wound to your bicep."

"And I made you run crying back to Kraehe with a gigantic gash across your stomach," Fakir replied dryly.

"You don't have to remind me of that. It was a valiant attempt, but it barely grazed the rectus abdominis muscle. Now, if you had just gone a little deeper, you would have gone right through that muscle and--" here Autor made a sound reminiscent of viscera being sliced open--"cut right through my small intestine. There's no way a person could survive something like that. If the blood loss hadn't killed me, the ensuing peritonitis would."

Fakir grimaced, looking away. "That's disgusting. Why the hell are you telling me this, Autor?"

"You could stand to retain a bit more intellectual knowledge. All you seem to know about is swordfighting. That's all muscle memory. Now this..." Autor's hand lashed out, and before Fakir could catch it, Autor's index and middle fingers were pressed against the side of Fakir's neck, a few inches below his jaw. "This is the carotid sinus. If I were to pinch here..."

"...you wouldn't get a chance," Fakir finished, yanking Autor's hand away by the wrist, "because I'd do this first." His fist collided with Autor's nose in a shower of blood, and he tossed the other boy to the ground, turning his back to him.

Autor laughed again. "How uncivilized. You might have gone with _'Et tu, Brute?'_"

"I don't speak Latin, Autor," Fakir growled. "You'll have to try that again in German."

"It means, 'Even you, Brutus?' But of course that still doesn't make any sense to you. When the Roman emperor Julius Caesar was assassinated, he had the unpleasant surprise of realizing that one of his closest friends, Marcus Junius Brutus, had been among those conspiring to kill him. Those are his alleged last words before he died of blood loss."

Fakir rolled his eyes, watching in the distance for any sign of movement. "Have you just been reading the whole time you've been at Kraehe's castle?"

"A fair amount of the time, yes." There was a scuffling sound behind Fakir; presumably, Autor had pushed himself to his feet again. "That's what I like about it, though. Kraehe permits me to do what I please, so long as I come when she calls. She feeds me and takes care of me. I don't have to do a single thing for myself, or for anyone else." Autor was suddenly far too close, his breath brushing against Fakir's ponytail. "You could come back with me, you know. She'd keep you happy, and you wouldn't have to worry about Mytho or Ahiru ever again..."

Fakir reached behind himself, shoving the other boy back by the waist. "I sincerely doubt Kraehe would take me as her second whore, Autor. And I'm not interested in becoming a fledgling to the mother of ravens."

"Then her murder will be out soon to collect their bounty." A few black feathers blew between Fakir's feet as Autor began to fade away. "Oh, and Fakir..."

Fakir refused to turn his head to look at him. "What?"

"My proper title is 'Prince Consort.'" With that, Autor was gone.

Fakir sighed and unsheathed his sword. There were times he wondered whether it wouldn't be better just to give up, to give in before they were inevitably forced to give in. The three of them could not survive much longer as they were, trapped inside a boarded-up and locked house, waiting anxiously for day so someone could sneak out and find some food. Sooner or later--probably sooner, Fakir thought grimly--the ravens would break into their house, and then it would be over. Mytho would die, and Ahiru either die with him or be enslaved by Kraehe. As for himself, Fakir thought it more fitting to impale himself on his sword as soon as that happened.

The only thing that kept him from breaking was his refusal to give in to the fear of ravens.


	3. Passive Victory

A/N: This is turning into a much longer project than I had originally envisioned. Chapters centered on Autor, Ahiru and Mytho are in the works. To tide you over in the meantime, please enjoy this glimpse into Kraehe's mind.

ETA: Oh, and the shift in verb tenses was intentional, in case anyone is wondering. I've had this hanging around my hard drive for so long it didn't occur to me people might think otherwise. xD

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Kraehe dreams of Princess Tutu, Ahiru, whatever that duck wants to call herself; for it is clear in this dream that she is only a duck, albeit with a spark of human intelligence in her eyes. Kraehe, cruel as she is, knows that Ahiru does not deserve to suffer. A stupid girl even when she was still a girl, she had no choice in becoming Princess Tutu, and no idea how much returning Mytho's heart would hurt Kraehe--hurt _Mytho_. For that reason she will not take the simpler route of slitting the animal's throat, but she cannot trust Ahiru to remain as she is, lest she ruin things again. She drops the story, a parchment scroll covered in Fakir's scrawling handwriting, into the fireplace. The duck's eyes dim, and she wanders away, never to return except by chance.

She dreams of Mytho, no longer Prince Siegfried, no longer ruined by his knight's twisted _love_. He lies on her bed, his wrists and ankles tied by red silk ribbons to the bedposts. His perfect body is only marred by a tiny scar on his left breast, but Kraehe does not count this a fault, because of what it signifies. He is heartless once again, mindless and without volition, unable to defy her. He cannot love her, but he cannot love anyone besides her, and that satisfies Kraehe more than anything as she makes her way to the bed, lying down beside him. She does not touch him sexually, and has no need to; he is too pure, too perfect to be defiled by such an animalistic act. She merely strokes his hair, and asks that he tell her he loves her, and he replies just as a heartless angel should: "I love you."

She dreams of the black knight spread-eagled before her, held fast not by the ribbons that bound her husband, but by sharpened feathers through his hands and feet ("Lovely people, those Romans were," Autor said once, "at least when it came to executing criminals," and he laughed, and she thought to herself how very nearly perfect he was). His eyes are far from blank, so wide open the irises are fully visible, following the knife in her hand as she holds it above him, teasing him with the promise of pain and death. She does not know whether he wishes for death or fears it at this point, and she does not care. He is but an object to her, not even a dog like the other Spinner is. A doll, albeit one that can bleed and scream. A toy.

Then the story in her mind takes an unexpected turn. The knight is no longer staring wide-eyed, but glaring, as though the prospect of death neither terrifies nor entices him. He opens his mouth and does not scream, but speaks like a man. "I will not give you the pleasure of hearing me scream," he tells her flatly. "Do as you will."

Kraehe's eyes narrow. Furious, she tears a gash from his collarbone to his navel with her knife, and he... makes no sound.

She wakes in a panic, shaking her pet, who as usual wakes as soon as he is touched. "Autor," she demands, gripping his shoulders. "We _will _kill Fakir someday, yes? You promised me. You _promised _me we would kill him."

"I promise," he replies strongly, "someday."

Kraehe sighs in relief and tucks his head beneath her chin. "Tell me how he'll scream."


End file.
